Ursula Oppens, Piano
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URSULA OPPENS, PIANO Artist Partner Program and Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library present URSULA OPPENS, PIANO Presented as part of the International Piano Archives at Maryland 50th Anniversary Celebration Thursday, February 4, 2016 . 8PM Joseph & Alma Gildenhorn Recital Hall 16 PROGRAM LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111 Maestoso — Allegro con brio ed appassionato Arietta: Adagio molto semplice e cantabile INTERMISSION FREDERIC RZEWSKI The People United Will Never Be Defeated!, 36 Variations on ¡El Pueblo Unido Jamás Será Vencido! Thema: With determination Variation 1: Weaving: delicate but firm Variation 2: With firmness Variation 3: Slightly slower, with expressive nuances Variation 4: Marcato Variation 5: Dreamlike, frozen Variation 6: Same tempo as beginning Variation 7: Lightly, impatiently Variation 8: With agility; not too much pedal; crisp Variation 9: Evenly Variation 10: Comodo, recklessly Variation 11: Tempo I, like fragments of an absent melody, in strict time Variation 12 Variation 13 Variation 14: A bit faster, optimistically Variation 15: Flexible, like an improvisation Variation 16: Same tempo as preceding, with fluctuations; much pedal — Expansive, with a victorious feeling Variation 17: L.H. [left hand] strictly: R.H. freely, roughly as in space Variation 18 Variation 19: With energy Variation 20: Crisp, precise Variation 21: Relentless, uncompromising Variation 22 Variation 23: As fast as possible, with some rubato Variation 24 Variation 25 17 PROGRAM (cont�d) Variation 26: In a militant manner Variation 27: Tenderly, with a hopeful expression — Cadenza Variation 28 Variation 29 Variation 30 Variation 31 Variation 32 Variation 33 Variation 34 Variation 35 Variation 36 Optional Improvisation Thema (reprise) This performance will last approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes, with one 15-minute intermission. Video or audio recording of the production is strictly prohibited. 18 ABOUT THE ARTIST Ursula Oppens has long been recognized as the As an orchestral guest soloist, Ms. Oppens has leading champion of contemporary American piano performed with virtually all of the world’s major music. Her original and perceptive readings of other orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, music, old and new, have earned her a place among the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Los Angeles the elect of today’s performing musicians. Philharmonic, the American Composers Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP) and In addition to tonight’s performance, highlights of the orchestras of Chicago, Cleveland, San Francisco Ms. Oppens’ 2015–2016 season have included recitals and Milwaukee. Abroad, she has appeared with at Northwestern University, New York’s Bargemusic, such ensembles as the Berlin Symphony, Orchestre the Cutting Edge New Music Festival and the Ascoli de la Suisse Romande, the Deutsche Symphonie, Piceno Festival in Italy. Ms. Oppens also returned the Scottish BBC and the London Philharmonic to Music Mountain for a performance with the Orchestras. Ms. Oppens is also an avid chamber Cassatt Quartet in September and was the featured musician and has performed with the Arditti, Cassatt, artist along with the International Contemporary JACK, Juilliard and Pacifica quartets, among other Ensemble in a residency celebrating composer chamber ensembles. Christian Wolff at Dartmouth College in October. Ms. Oppens will also perform at The Phillips Ursula Oppens is a Distinguished Professor of Music Collection in Washington DC, and Symphony Space at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate in New York City. A prolific and critically acclaimed Center in New York City. From 1994 through the recording artist with four GRAMMY nominations, end of the 2007–2008 academic year she served Ms. Oppens’ recent releases include a new recording as John Evans Distinguished Professor of Music of Frederic Rzewski’s The People United Will Never at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. Be Defeated!; a collaboration with Meredith Monk, In addition, Ms. Oppens has served as a juror for Piano Songs; the GRAMMY-nominated Winging many international competitions, such as the It: Piano Music of John Corigliano; and Oppens Plays Concert Artists Guild, Young Concert Artists, Young Carter, a recording of the complete piano works of Pianists Foundation (Amsterdam) and Cincinnati Elliott Carter. Piano World Competition. Ms. Oppens lives in New York City. Over the years, Ms. Oppens has premiered works by such leading composers as John Adams, Luciano Berio, William Bolcom, Anthony Braxton, Elliott Carter, John Corigliano, Anthony Davis, John Harbison, Julius Hemphill, Laura Kaminsky, Tania Leon, György Ligeti, Witold Lutoslawski, Harold Meltzer, Meredith Monk, Conlon Nancarrow, Tobias Picker, Bernard Rands, Frederic Rzewski, Allen Shawn, Alvin Singleton, Joan Tower, Lois V Vierk, Amy Williams, Christian Wolff, Amnon Wolman and Charles Wuorinen. 19 ABOUT THE PROGRAM Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111 (Op. 106, “Hammerklavier”) and Grosse Fuge (Op. LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770–1827) 133). (An edition of the Sonata published in London Composed in 1821–1822 by Muzio Clementi was dedicated to Antonie Brentano, whom the composer’s biographer Beethoven’s painful five-year court battle to secure Maynard Solomon convincingly identified as the custody of his nephew Karl from his brother Caspar’s long-mysterious “Immortal Beloved.”) dissolute widow (whom the composer disparaged as the “Queen of the Night”) finally came to an Beethoven chose for the C Minor Sonata the end early in 1820. He won the case, but lost the unusual structure of two vast movements — a boy’s affection (Karl, half crazed from his uncle’s tempestuous essay in sonata form followed by a set overbearing attention, tried, unsuccessfully, to kill of lofty variations of ethereal character — which himself); the trial also exploded the composer’s own are contrasted at almost every level: tonality (C pretension that he was of noble blood. Beethoven minor, C major); rhythm (fiery, placid); melody was further troubled in 1820 by deteriorating health (craggy and filled with dramatic leaps, hymnal and a certain financial distress (he needed a loan and smoothly flowing); harmony (chromatic and from his brother Johann, a prosperous apothecary bold, pure and introspective); texture (contrapuntal, in Vienna, to tide him over that difficult period), chordal). Beethoven drew criticism when the so it is not surprising that he composed little Sonata was new from some who felt that the music during the time. With the resolution of his work was incomplete, lacking a spirited rondo to custody suit, however, he returned to creative work bring it to a brilliant close. When Anton Schindler, and began anew the titanic struggle to embody Beethoven’s amanuensis and eventual biographer his transcendent thoughts in musical tones. In no and one of those who felt cheated of a proper finale, apparent hurry to dispel the rumors in gossipy asked the composer why he had included just two Vienna that he was “written out,” he produced just movements, Beethoven answered facetiously that one composition in 1820, the Piano Sonata in E he did not have time to write a third one because Major, Op. 109, but followed that quickly with the of the press of his work on the Ninth Symphony. A-flat Sonata, Op. 110, dated on Christmas Day Despite Schindler’s misgivings, the C Minor Sonata 1821, and the Sonata in C Minor, Op. 111, finished is not only complete as it stands, but occupies the just three weeks later, on January 13, 1822. The C very pinnacle of Beethoven’s writing for the piano, Minor Sonata was his last such work, followed in his the culmination of his lifetime of creative thought output for piano only by the Diabelli Variations and and first-hand experience as pianist and composer the two late sets of Bagatelles (Op. 119 and Op. 126). for the keyboard. This music is not only the product Upon its publication in April 1823 by the Parisian of the obsession of his last years with motivic firm of Maurice Schlesinger, the Op. 111 Sonata development, fugue, variation and the very essence was dedicated to the Archduke Rudolph, youngest of musical form, but it also embodies the potent son of Emperor Leopold II and brother of Emperor emotional-philosophical progression of darkness- Franz, who had been Beethoven’s student of piano to-light, struggle-to-transcendence, minor-to- and composition for 20 years. Rudolph received major that makes the Fifth and Ninth Symphonies altogether the dedications of 15 of Beethoven’s such powerful utterances. most important works, including the Missa Solemnis, Fourth and Fifth Piano Concertos, Op. 97 Piano Trio (“Archduke”), Piano Sonata in B-flat 20 The People United Will Never Be Defeated!, of the Arts, University of California at San Diego, 36 Variations on ¡El Pueblo Unido Jamás Mills College, Royal Conservatory of the Hague, Será Vencido! Hochschule der Künste in Berlin and Hochschule FREDERIC RZEWSKI für Musik in Karlsruhe. Born April 13, 1938 in Rzewski’s music is dynamic in impact, original in Westfield, Massachusetts concept, and diverse and distinctive in personality Composed in 1975 — some of his works (Les Moutons de Panurge) Premiered on February 7, 1976 in incorporate improvisation, some use twelve-tone Washington DC by Ursula Oppens technique in novel ways (Antigone Legend, The Persians); some employ experimental and graphic Frederic Rzewski is one of modern music’s great notation (Le Silence des Espaces Infins, The Price of iconoclasts. Rzewski (r’ZHEFF-skee),